Tuesday, May 28, 2013

BLT Pizza

I saw this on Facebook the other day...BLT Pizza.
So of course I had to make it.

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Simple ingredients... loved that I had them all on hand! A gob of grape tomatoes...

Some mozzarella cheese, bacon, and creamy Caesar salad dressing...

I used some homemade pizza dough.
Added a layer of creamy Caesar salad dressing.
Topped that with some crushed pepper flakes and ground black pepper.
Sprinkled on some pre-cooked bacon crumbles (I had a coupon!)
And added some grated mozzarella cheese.

Baked it in a really hot oven (485 degrees) on my pizza stone until the cheese started to turn brown and the crust was crisp.

Mmmmmm....... pizza.

Oh! Almost forgot the cool crisp lettuce on top of the slice. Wouldn't be a BLT without the L.

This recipe a snap to put together since I had the pre-cooked bacon. I had planned to cook up some turkey bacon for this recipe but I was busy and remembered the jar of pre-cooked bacon in the cupboard.

I did not alter the recipe that much. I used my own pizza crust recipe and used way less cheese than the recipe called for. I think I could have used less creamy Caesar salad dressing (I think I used close to 1/2 cup as is recommended in the original recipe); it's rather rich even though I used a "lite" version.

I really did not measure any of the ingredients, I just followed the list of ingredients in the original recipe.

pizza crust (you could use whatever you like or see recipe below)

creamy Caesar salad dressing

crushed red pepper flakes

freshly ground black pepper

cooked bacon crumbles

diced tomatoes (I used grape tomatoes)

shredded romaine lettuce

Ready to make this BLT Pizza? Let's go!

Move your oven rack to the highest position available.

Place your pizza stone in the oven on the top rack.

Preheat your oven and pizza stone to 485 degrees Fahrenheit.

Assemble all of your ingredients and have them ready; you want to work rather quickly once the dough hits the hot, hot, hot pizza stone.

On a cutting board, sheet pan, or clean counter top, roll your crust out into a sort of round shape about the size of your pizza stone. Use a little a little flour on your work surface and rolling pin to keep the dough from sticking. You can also put a little cornmeal under the dough.

Once your pizza stone and oven are preheated to 485 degrees, put your smokin' hot pizza stone on the counter top every hot pad you own to protect your counter top. Carefully put the dough on the pizza stone... shape the dough a little if you need to but it pretty much starts to cook the second you put the dough on the stone so you don't have a lot of time to mess with it. Top the dough with the creamy Caesar salad dressing, crushed red pepper flakes, ground black pepper, tomatoes, bacon crumbles, and then the grated cheese. Quickly and carefully get this pie in the oven.

Bake 10 to 13 minutes, depending on how well done you like your pizza. I like it crisp on the bottom and the cheese browned on the top. Start checking after 10 minutes. Things can change quickly in 1 minute when the oven is this hot. I usually turn the pizza 180 degrees since the back of my oven is hotter than the front of the oven.

Slide pizza carefully off of the pizza stone and onto a cutting board or sheet pan; slice into 8 slices. Top as desired with shredded lettuce. Enjoy!

Place ingredients in the bread machine in the order listed. I put the yeast on top of the flour and I put the salt, yeast, sugar, and oil, in the corners. Set to "dough" setting and start (according to your bread machine's instructions. My dough cycle takes 1 1/2 hours. Let the dough rest for about 20 to 30 minutes before rolling out. If dough is refrigerated, let it come to room temperature before rolling (sit out for 1 to 2 hours to come to room temperature).